Performance Evaluation of Outpatient Department Waiting Line System in a City Hospital in Nigeria

Abstract

In this paper, performance evaluation of outpatient department waiting line system in a city hospital in Nigeria has been studied using a multiple server queuing model. The relevant data used in the research were collected for a period of four weeks through direct observations and interviews. The results of the research showed that with Two Doctors for the morning session patients spent an average of 1.0233hours in the system, out of which 0.932hours are spent on the queue with 95.45% Doctor Utilization. When the numbers of the Doctors were increased to 3, 4 and 5, it was found that a patient will spend an average of 0.125hours, 0.0975 hours and 0.0924hours in the system respectively. In each of the 3, 4 and 5 Doctors increased, the system will have 63.64%, 47.73% and 38.18% Doctors utilization respectively. With one Doctor for the evening session, the system has 54.55% Doctor Utilization and patient spent
0.2hours in the system. The overall results showed that there is need to increase the number of Doctors to 3 or 4 for the morning session to achieved optimal service delivery while one Doctor in the evening session should be maintained. The results from the research could serves as important information to the management of the hospital for better services delivery.

Keywords: Doctors, Patient, Doctor Utilization, Queuing model, Evaluation